The Neuro-Consumer

Adapting Marketing and Communication Strategies for the Subconscious, Instinctive and Irrational Consumer's Brain

Anne-Sophie Bayle-Tourtoulou, Michel Badoc

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000055528
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Negocios y empresa
• Subtopic: Comportamiento del consumidor

Neuroscientific research shows that the great majority of purchase decisions are irrational and driven by subconscious mechanisms in our brains. This is hugely disruptive to the rational, logical arguments of traditional communication and marketing practices and we are just starting to understand how organizations must adapt their strategies. This book explains the subconscious behavior of the "neuro-consumer" and shows how major international companies are using these findings to cast light on their own consumers' behavior.

Written in plain English for business and management readers with no scientific background, it focuses on:

• how to adapt marketing and communication to the subconscious and irrational behaviors of consumers;
• the direct influence of the primary senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch) on purchasing decisions and the perception of communications by customers' brains;
• implications for innovation, packaging, price, retail environments and advertising;
• the use of "nudges" and artifices to increase marketing and communication efficiency by making them neuro-compatible with the brain's subconscious expectations;
• the influence of social media and communities on consumers' decisions – when collective conscience is gradually replacing individual conscience and recommendation becomes more important than communication; and
• the ethical limits and considerations that organizations must heed when following these principles.

Authored by two globally recognized leaders in business and neuroscience, this book is an essential companion to marketers and brand strategists interested in neuroscience and vital reading for any advanced student or researcher in this area.

Part I

The advent of the neuro-consumer

Man’s “subconscious, instinctive, irrational” behavior has long remained an enigma for philosophers, psychologists and sociologists, as it has for those involved in marketing. By using neuroscientific techniques that enable us to visualize and observe how the brain functions, it has become possible to shed light on the mystery. Studying the “neuro-consumer” makes an essential contribution to understanding consumer behavior.

Introduction

A significant number of works have been devoted to studying consumer behavior. Their contributions allow companies to improve their marketing efforts thanks to a better understanding of their clients. While their quality is not in question, these studies have multiple limitations, which often result from their research and analysis methodology. New techniques in the field of neuroscience are now available to enrich consumer behavior knowledge. These techniques are not intended to replace the research that has been conducted through other methods but rather to complement them. The use of new technologies such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or electroencephalography (EEG), which allow researchers to observe the brain’s reaction to marketing and communication stimuli, offers greater depth to the information that is collected through traditional studies. Thanks to neuroscience, it is possible to confirm or invalidate observations made by philosophers or marketing researchers but also to explain and complement them. Direct observation of the consumer’s brain reveals a lot of surprises.

In these early days of the 21st century, scientists from a variety of different fields are showing growing interest in how the brain works. Having long been underestimated over the last centuries, knowledge of the human brain has now become an increasingly popular field of research.

After psychologists and sociologists, marketing researchers now feel the need to understand the instinctive and most often subconscious behavior of the neuro-consumer. This trend is a relatively recent one. The first studies led by Read Montague and his American colleagues date back to the turn of this century. By looking into the evolution of neuroscientific knowledge, using techniques stemming from neuroscience, researchers are discovering new horizons enabling a better insight into consumer behavior, when buying processes and perceptions are under the direct influence of the brain’s automatisms.

The efficiency of these new techniques raises questions related to the possible intrusion into individual freedom as well as manipulation. It is essential to build a set of ethical and deontological rules as safeguards against potential abuse.

Chapter 1

From philosophical theory to neuroscience

Neuroscientists express genuine interest in the various theories of thinkers and philosophers on human behavior. Some of these theories enable neuroscientists to build hypotheses linked to the behavior of the human brain when submitted to environmental stimuli. They are then verified with the aid of neuroscientific techniques.

World-renowned neurologist Antonio Damasio draws inspiration from philosophers such as Descartes or Spinoza to devise hypotheses relative to his neuroscientific experiences. American philosopher Patricia Churchland highlights the strong links between philosophy and neuroscience.

The pursuit of happiness and consumer behavior

Neurologists often consider that one of our brain’s main functions is to contribute to our happiness by ensuring that body and mind work in a balanced and harmonized manner thanks to the hormonal system. This process, called homeostasis, affects the behavior of individuals in consumer situations.

The pursuit of happiness is one of the fundamental concerns of many philosophical schools of thought and we start this book by referring to some of their ideas that could potentially orient consumer behavior. The book by Frédéric Lenoir, Happiness: A Philosopher’s Guide,¹ as well as other works by various philosophers, helped us summarize the ideas that are interesting for 21st-century neuroscientists.

A first dichotomy separates thinkers who believe that happiness cannot be achieved in the world we live in and those who believe the opposite. This divergence of beliefs triggers different – sometimes opposite – buying behaviors.

The former school of thought is strongly sustained by Judeo-Christian religions. It is supported by a large number of philosophers such as Socrates, Pascal, Descartes and Kant. As happiness cannot be achieved in this world, it is essential to comply with moral rules that will enable to achieve it in another. Socrates, according to Plato, would talk about a “good life” on Earth, based on virtue and the values of the city, rather than a “happy life.” Like Jesus, Socrates did not hesitate to sacrifice his own life in the name of a greater truth and high values, aspiring in this way to achieve genuine happiness after death. In his work, philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) summarizes this idea. For Kant, “full and complete happiness does not exist on earth: it is an ideal of imagination.”² One can only hope to achieve ideal happiness and eternal bliss after death. It is a reward bestowed by God on those who have lived a just and moral life.

This philosophical approach is attached to achieving sainthood rather than wisdom. It can trigger behavioral responses among some categories of consumers whose brain is culturally influenced by these beliefs.

Those who support these ideas might sometimes embrace a somewhat ascetic behavior when they are facing enticements from marketing and communication. They exhibit a preference for what is natural and reject what they consider “overrated.” This might lead certain people to reject consumer society and brands. Those who abide by this creed are attracted to unbranded products, “hard discount” or low-cost products. They choose the offers they deem compatible with their principles or morals (fair-trade or sustainably manufactured goods or goods offered by socially responsible corporations), products that are in harmony with nature and crafts that are closely related to it (natural or organic, strongly marked by local customs and traditions).

On the contrary, many philosophical schools of thought believe that happiness can and should be found in our world. This, however, does not necessarily mean that there cannot also be a certain form of happiness after death, except in the case of nonbelievers.

Aristotle and Epicurus are renowned for advocating a lifestyle full of pleasure.

Alexander the Great’s teacher, Aristotle (384–322 BC) left the academy of his master, Plato, to found his own school, the Lyceum, in Athens in 335 BC. In his work Nicomachean Ethics,³ which extensively deals with the idea of happiness, he wrote that “there is no happiness without pleasure.” For this philosopher, pleasure is an enjoyable feeling linked to the satisfaction of a need or desire of the body, but also of the mind. Pleasure is the main driver of our actions. He also advocates adopting a behavior that leads to “seeking the highest level of pleasure with the highest level of reason.”

Epicurus (341–270 BC), whose name remains to this day associated with the notion of the pursuit of pleasure, also founded his own school in Greece, the Garden. In his teachings and main writings, Letter to Menoeceus and Letters and Sayings,⁴ he makes a distinction between three types of desires. The first type includes the natural, necessary desires (food, drink, clothes, accommodation). The second are natural, nonessential desires (luxury clothes, fine cuisine, comfortable dwelling). The third are desires he considers neither natural nor fundamental (power, honour, pomp). To achieve happiness in our world, he recommends behaving so as to satisfy the first type, to seek to satisfy the second but to avoid the third. His pursuit of happiness was moderate and does not correspond to the image of Epicureanism we have today, which is sometimes associated with debauchery, luxury and the quest for immoderate pleasure.

In the 16th century, Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592), whom Friedrich Nietzsche would later refer to as the first modern thinker, suggested in his Essays⁵ to find happiness by creating “a joyful path of happiness, consistent with one’s nature.” He advocates loving life and enjoying the pleasures it offers in a balanced and flexible manner according to the needs of one’s own nature. The behavior he recommends, which he also adopts, consists of being as happy as possible according to his own aspirations, by enjoying the day-to-day pleasures that life offers.

In West–East Divan,⁶ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832) suggests that “happiness consists of living according to one’s nature, developing one’s personality to be able to enjoy life and the world with heightened levels of sensitivity.”

Consumers abiding by this type of philosophy are more likely to adopt a hedonistic, even “epicurean” lifestyle. They strive to enjoy the present moment and show an interest in the acquisition of consumer goods or pleasure, of luxury items.

From philosophical theory to neuroscience

Neuroscientists often refer to philosophical concepts to test some hypotheses in order to better understand the fundamentals of brain behavior, through specific techniques.

Such is the case when trying, for instance, to explain the relationship between body and mind, the role of emotions, of memory, of desire, etc.

Neurologist Antonio Damasio, in two famous works,⁷ questions Descartes’ theories, which state that body and mind are separate and, on the contrary, supports Spinoza’s theories, in which the philosopher highlights a deep interaction between these two components of human nature.

The writings of Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860),⁸ which show the fundamental role of health on the aptitude of happiness or unhappiness (“a healthy beggar is happier than a sick king”) interest the neuroscientists, who study the link between the body’s well-being and individual behavior.

Antonio Damasio is also very attentive to Ethics,⁹ the book of Baruch Spinoza, later known as Benedict de Spinoza (1632–1677). He recognizes the philosopher’s contribution in highlighting the key role played by what Spinoza named “affects” – i.e., emotions – in the conditioning of human behavior. He strives to test these theories through neuroscientific analysis within the neurology department of the Iowa Institute in the United States.

The relations between behavior and memory have been the basis of many studies by neurologists.

In the Philebus,¹⁰ Plato (428–348 BC) insists on the memory’s role on happiness, as well as on the influence of the recall of bodily pleasures on behavior: “It is because I have kept in memory the intense pleasure I felt when drinking good wine that I am happy not only to remember it but also to taste it again.” More recently, Proust (1871–1922) in In Search of Lost Times,¹¹ describes the interrelation between memory and some senses, such as the sense of smell. Through smell, an individual is able to relive in the present happy moments he experienced in the past. This phenomenon is the basis of neuroscientific and neuromarketing research in influencing consumers’ senses, especially on the point of sale. Regarding memory, Antonio Damasio elaborated his “somatic marker” theory, which we will develop in a later chapter.

Desire, as a source of pleasure and driver of consumption, is also currently being studied by several neuroscientific laboratories in Europe as well as in the United States. Spinoza offered them something important to ponder when he said, “It is not because things are beautiful or good that I desire them; it is because I desire them that they are beautiful or good.”¹²

Joseph Breuer (1842–1925) and Sigmund Freud (1856–1939), along with Carl Gustav Jung (1856–1939)¹³ are considered as the precursors of the recognition of the role of the unconscious in explaining human...